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Christo scores four times in Masuk's win over New Milford

Jon Chik| on January 23, 2014

SHELTON -- All things considered, Wednesday night's game with Masuk at The Rinks at Shelton wasn't looking all that bad for New Milford after the opening period.

Despite Masuk dominating in time on the attack, New Milford was just a goal down and it earned a power play in the first minute of the second period after a scramble in front of the Masuk net forced the Panthers to take a penalty.

Unfortunately, not only did the Green Wave not capitalize, they surrendered a short-handed tally to Cole Butkovsky in a game that also saw Masuk's Charlie Christo score four times, as the Panthers claimed the 6-3 victory.

"I think we cashed in on our opportunities. We had a couple power-play goals, a short-handed goal, and all around, we just played a good fundamental hockey game," Masuk coach Andrew Townsend said.

Christo's second and third markers were spaced just over three minutes apart, as the Masuk junior struck at the 16:44 and 19:47 marks of the second period to boost the Panther lead to 5-1 going into the third.

"We work on (special teams) a lot in practice and it paid off in the game tonight," Christo said. "The first two seasons we were all freshmen and sophomores and now we're all grown up with mostly juniors and seniors."

Masuk's Shane Dushay came up with a loose puck in the attacking zone and went 5-hole to score unassisted, giving his Panthers a 1-0 advantage 4:26 into play.

Operating on the power play, Masuk doubled its lead less than three minutes later when Christo gathered a rebound and sent a wrist shot home for the 2-0 lead.

"There was a lack of intensity all the way around," said New Milford coach Danny Moore, who saw his team's seven-game win streak come to an end. "We were flat all the way through it, and we just didn't have it at all tonight. Just didn't have it."

After being stymied by Masuk's defense as well as a handful of quality saves by netminder Connor Muller, New Milford broke through when Harrison O'Connell won the battle for a loose puck, digging it out of the corner, skating in front of the net and roofing his shot to cut the Green Wave deficit to 2-1 late in the first.

New Milford threatened to knot it up in the final three seconds of the opening period when O'Connell moved a centering pass to Thomas Nisco, who was denied when Muller dove to his left to send the shot wide.

"(Masuk's short-handed goal) was a big turning point in the game," Moore said. "We score there and it's tied up. Then we turn it over and they got a short-handed goal, and it kind of set the tone for the rest of the way."